It's possible to use the referral program to also incentivize potential customers to sign-up by automatically applying a coupon to their cart when they follow a referral URL.
In order to accomplish this, first add a coupon for the reward you want your potential customers to receive.
Next up, navigate to your Referral Program settings page.
In the "Landing Destination" section, choose "Custom Page." In the field, enter "/ac/" followed by the coupon code of the potential customer reward coupon that you just created.
For example, I added a coupon with the coupon code of "REFEREE10" therefore my "Custom Page" link looks like this:
Now, when potential customers follow their friend's referral URLs, they'll have the REFEREE10 coupon automatically added to their cart.
If you want customers to re-direct to a specific page in your store, simply add "?next=<page name>/" following the coupon code in the Custom Page field. Without a page name, it will redirect to your homepage.